Golan knocks Lapid for saying no future government will include Arab parties

Democrats chair Yair Golan knocks Opposition chief Yair Lapid for saying yesterday that there won’t be another government with Arab parties after Hamas’s October 7 attack.

Lapid was one of the main architects of the previous coalition, which for the first time included an Arab-majority party. It fell apart after one year due largely to fissures on the the bloc’s right-wing flank, though, the Islamist Ra’am party was also responsible for several coalition crises throughout the brief tenure.

Lapid was quoted as having said at an event yesterday that “there will be no government with the Arabs again after October 7. The public is not ready for a government that depends on Arab votes.”

Hitting back at Lapid, Golan tweets, “It’s not the Arabs in Israel who are responsible for October 7. Those responsible for the massacre are Hamas and the one responsible for the failure is [Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu.

“The public in Israel is ready — incredibly ready — for a different government. Not a government of blood and failure, but a democratic, Zionist government that understands what needs to be done to save Israel and win,” the left-wing lawmaker continues.

“Anyone who continues to disqualify the Arabs as political partners, especially at this critical moment, is aligning with the extreme right, doesn’t understand how dangerous the current government is and how grave our reality is today,” Golan adds.

Responding to Golan, a Lapid spokesperson told The Times of Israel that the Democrats chair “and the left know that Yair Lapid is the only one who can be trusted to know how to form a new government in Israel.”

Since October 7, Lapid has repeatedly argued that forming another narrow coalition that is reliant on Arab-majority parties won’t be politically possible.